Self-hosting has become more and more accessible over the years. The growth of communities like r/selfhosted and wider public coverage, like on the Linus Tech Tips or PewDiePie YouTube channels proves that this is no longer a niche hobby, but is slowly reaching the mainstream. A plethora of applications that promise to make the user experience “normie-ready” also exist now. One of the first products of this kind was Unraid, with a community-driven app-store kind of interface to easily install applications, it quickly grew quite the following. Nowadays there are even options like PikaPods, which is basically a SaaS provider for popular self-hosted alternatives to the services of Google, Apple, Microsoft, and the like.
But what if I told you that the next evolution for regular non-technical users might come from exactly those companies?
???⌗
- …WHY would anyone want to go to a solution by the company they try to replace in the first place?
- …WHY would companies that rely on revenue through their exclusive, cloud-hosted, subscription-financed services suddenly want their users to self-host?
Well…⌗
The Hardware⌗
The idea for this concept struck me when Apple unveiled their newest entry to the Mac-Mini lineup. Whether you like Apple or not, this machine is pretty nice:
- Small dimensions
- Near-silent operation
- Low power usage
- Plenty of performance, even for tasks like LLMs or video decoding
- Prices starting at $599.00
In my opinion, this machine has pretty much everything you would need in a great home server.
The Software⌗
I’m pretty sure Apple would not want their users to rely on the usual community-driven catalog of software. But they would not need to, they already have everything they need. iCloud, HomeKit, heck, even Siri. I’m pretty sure that a current-gen Mac Mini is plenty to run their stack.
Actual Problems⌗
Uptime:⌗
This is a big one; non-technical users might get frustrated IF something breaks.
Backups:⌗
This could be easily used to bring back recurring revenue. Apple could provide a monthly-paid (encrypted) backup service.
Internet speeds⌗
Another big one, this product would not really work for users with slow upload speeds. Residential lines also typically feature better download than upload speeds.
Why would any Company want to do this?⌗
Not being responsible for users’ data⌗
Not too long ago, there was some kerfuffle about Apple being forced to add a backdoor to their “Advanced Data Protection” for users in the UK. Apple has already shown that they prefer not adding backdoors, so why not just give the user the full sovereignty about software as well as hardware? Regulators can’t really ban disk-encryption – can they? (I really, really, really hope not).
A new kind of device with minimal effort.⌗
The effort to make this work would be really minimal. Just take the aforementioned Mac Mini, add a few extra SSD-Slots (one can dream) and a modified headless version of macOS and you have your iHost. Since this is a new kind of device, every power user or privacy-conscious user could become a customer, potentially spending thousands for a beefy model. I’d even say this might be the biggest new revenue generator for Apple since the iPad.
Why would any user want this⌗
Local Operation⌗
Anyone who works with 4K video files or similar files of epic proportions knows how tedious hard storing them becomes. Slap a few NVME SSDs and 10G Networking into your iHost and watch your files fly. This way, users also do not have to rely on Apple servers working, nor their ISP.
All-in-one ecosystem⌗
Popular self-hosted software mostly suffers from a major problem to integrate it with the larger masses: Inconsistency. Every UI looks different; some applications need their own clients, which might or might not work how you want them to. People also like to use the software that already comes with their device.
Privacy⌗
It really is a win-win for Apple, as well as the users. Apple can say with full confidence that the user is the only one able to look at their data and doesn’t even have to take responsibility.